


darling, you drive me to distraction

by fourhorsemen



Category: Inception (2010)
Genre: From Sex to Love, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-26
Updated: 2019-10-26
Packaged: 2021-01-03 23:48:59
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,938
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21188030
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fourhorsemen/pseuds/fourhorsemen
Summary: "The first time Arthur and Eames meet, Eames is in bed with him by the end of the night.--There’s a reason Arthur is so reluctant to let Cobb hire Eames in Inception.





	darling, you drive me to distraction

**Author's Note:**

> This was supposed to be PWP, fully Arthur POV. Then suddenly midway through Eames took the reins and turned it into Romance.

The first time Arthur and Eames meet, Eames is in bed with him by the end of the night.

“Oh  _fuck _,  _ah _, harder,” Arthur pants, holding his knees to his chest, fingers slipping for purchase as the sweat accumulates in the crease of his knees. Eames pounds into him, headboard slamming with every powerful thrust. Arthur’s eyes are stuck on his filthy smirk and the little grunts and slips of praise escaping his plush lips, “_Yes__, love, just like that. Open up for me- oh pet, you were made for this_.” 

Arthur’s  eyes roll back in his head and his mouth falls open when Eames quickens his pace, milking his prostate with every thrust. He can feel the sweat beading at his temples as his orgasm approaches, his thighs trembling and fingers gripping harder. Eames’ thumbs dig into his hipbones, his thrusts growing less consistent, jerky, uncoordinated, face red and mouth glistening.

“Fuck, _ your mouth_,”Arthur groans and Eames chuckles, leaning down to sloppily push his tongue into Arthur’s mouth. “_Mhhhm _, I’ll suck you off next time, put that pretty little cock in my mouth, have you  begging for it,” he murmurs into his mouth and Arthur shudders. Arthur lets go of his knees and grasps Eames' broad shoulders with sweaty palms, arching upwards for a better angle.

“Come on,  come on, ” he gasps, rubbing his dick onto Eames abdomen, trying to get enough friction to push him into the orgasm just waiting to bubble over. Eames grunts and pulls out, “_What are you_-“  Arthur whines, feeling empty, until suddenly his dick is surrounded by  _slick,  __wet heat_ and the tight suction from Eames’ pillowy lips. He shoots off embarrassingly fast, coming into Eames' mouth.

He watches Eames suck him dry with wide eyes and a flush high on his cheeks, riding the remnants of orgasm, thrusting weakly into his mouth. He’s just about to push Eames off, wincing at the over sensitivity when Eames pulls off him. He kneels over Arthur and jerks himself, dark eyes burning into Arthur’s, mouth open, slick with a deliciously hot streak of come on his bottom lip and then comes all over Arthur’s navel with a choked off groan.

Eames falls onto the empty side of the bed, half of him covering Arthur and they both catch their breath. Arthur stares at the ceiling, blinking stars from his eyes. He clears his throat.

“Nice to meet you, I’m Arthur, Dominic Cobb’s point man,” he says, turning slightly to look at Eames, who leers at him, one eyebrow raised in amusement.

“Eames, forger, pleasure's all mine darling,” he drawls and chuckles when all Arthur does is stare at his swollen lips. 

This probably isn’t what Cobb meant when he told Arthur to introduce himself to their new hire. 

—

Arthur tries to brush off his lapse in professionalism as a fluke. He was probably feeling a bit pent up that day, that's all... Eames eyeing him head to toe before he even said a word had practically been the world's biggest green light. He wouldn't face the same issue again, surely. Surely, he wouldn't. 

Then, there's their second job. 

"_Fuck you,_ we're on the clock, Eames!"  Arthur says through grit teeth, hips thrusting uncontrollably into Eames' mouth. Eames pushes his hips into the wall and swallows him down further, lips stretched red and wide around Arthur's dick. Arthur moans, grabbing a fistful of the man's hair, whose muffled groan only makes him tug harder on the strands. 

He's undone, leaning on the wall of the warehouse they're working out of. Cobb is out looking for a chemist, trusting him to be accessing the mark's emails, phone records and bank accounts in his absence and here he is with his dick down their forger's throat. He chokes on his own saliva when Eames tongues at his slit and bangs his fist against the wall,  hard.  Arthur keens, babbles, _begs _ for release and its' Eames dirty, vibrating chuckle that makes him blow his load with a shout.

Arthur glares at Eames as the man rises to his feet, smirking at him, unrepentant, as if he's not supposed to be watching surveillance videos of the mark's wife right now. He takes Arthur's hand and puts it on his crotch, where his erection is straining against the tented fabric. Arthur ignores the saliva pooling in his mouth like some sort of fucked up Pavlovlian response in order to glare at the man more effectively. 

"Oh, come on, darling. Don't leave a man hanging," Eames says through a pout, lips red and abused and Arthur relents, oh so quickly. He unzips Eames and wraps a hand around him, jerking him at a slow, leisurely pace that has Eames biting his lips to suppress his groans. Arthur grins at him, cheeks dimpling and Eames knees shudder. Eames slaps a hand onto the wall for support and crowds in closer, the wet head of his dick almost touching Arthur's clothed thigh. 

"Don't you dare come on my suit," Arthur warns, eyes narrowing and Eames just leers at him. Arthur rolls his eyes, jerking him faster, adding a twist to his wrist that has Eames  trembling. Eames comes just as they hear the warehouse door creak open and Cobb speaks, " _Arthur? I need you to do a background check on __-_" 

Cobb, the poor bastard, falls prey to Eames charming, glib lies. Arthur, floundering for an excuse, begs off for with a mild fever, his furious blush making it easily believable. 

—

Their third job together, well.

(" _Oh, oh, oh, fuck, Eames_, please, please just- _Please!"_ Arthur begs, voice hoarse and needy. He has his face buried in the pillow, legs trembling as Eames eats him out, tongue spearing into him, fingers stretching him wide as he licks along the rim, switching between the two with seemingly with no pattern. Arthur is wrecked, legs feeling like jelly, moaning uncontrollably like a two dollar  _whore_.

"Please what, poppet? You're going to have to be a little more specific,"  Eames purrs, kissing him on the curve of his ass, voice rumblingwith unrestrained lust. Arthur pants, whines high in his throat and thrusts his hips back, begging wordlessly. Eames chuckles and goes right back to it, lick, suck, repeat until Arthur is screaming, " Oh God, fuck me, please! _Fuck me Eames, put your dick in me, please, please, please_!"  and Eames does. 

The next morning, Arthur happens to walkout the same time as the middle-aged couple staying in the hotel room next door. He flushes to the roots of his hair at the look they give him.)

—

It's after their fourth job together, when all it takes is a glib comment from Eames and a dark-eyed stare from across the room to make him lose focus for the rest of the day, waiting desperately until they can be alone. Finally having a clear mind once Eames fucks him into the mattress, only toslip into a daydream every time he feels the soreness in his ass the next day. A gut-punch of lust and shame, every  single time he shifts on his chair, gets up to pick up a file and sees Eames eyes  burning into him.It finally drives home to him that he  _cannot _work with Eames.

—

The next time Cobb suggests bringing Eames on, Arthur does his research and finds a forger that's much cheaper and much more conveniently located. Cobb is confused but nonetheless swayed by the case Arthur makes and so they take on Nash. Nash is not the best, hardly even mediocre, but he gets the job done. Nash gets the job done and he doesn't make Arthur burn hot under the collar, doesn't make him want to bend right over his desk in front of everyone if it means he can get those hands on him sooner, that dick in him sooner. 

But after Cobol, well. Arthur doesn't really have much of a choice. 

—

"Eames? But he's in Mombasa. Cobol's backyard," Arthur says quickly, feeling a rush of panic. Cobb brushes him off.

"Necessary risk," he says and Arthur tries to hold his attention until Cobb does what he always does and dismisses him after half a second of silence.

"There are plenty of other thieves," Arthur argues, feeling his ears heat up at the thought of seeing Eames again, having to... Having to deal with being _ in proximity_ to Eames again... but he can see that glint in Cobb's eyes that means he won't listen to any protest because he knows his idea is indisputably the best option. 

"We don't just need a thief. We need a forger, and a good one," Cobb says pointedly and Arthur tries not to wince at the reminder that Nash had been his foolhardy suggestion, just so he could be far, far away from Eames. Even from afar, Eames had the tendency to scramble Arthur's perfectly rational, always reliable thought processes. 

"Look, Cobb-" Arthur begins, not sure where he will end with that sentence, but Cobb is already grabbing his messenger bag and striding out of the warehouse, with nary a word to Arthur about what he's to do in the mean time. Arthur sighs, wonders what he was going to say to Cobb, "_Look, Cobb, Eames is... I can't work with Eames, Eames is too much of a distraction for me_,"  and grimaces at the confused, mystified expression Cobb would give him in said hypothetical scenario.

Well, he might as well train Ariadne on paradoxical dream architecture in the mean time, busy himself with the job and... fortify his defenses. 

—

"Inception. Don't bother telling me it's impossible," Cobb says, immediately on the defensive, as if someone had already told him it was impossible. Eames had an inkling of who that may be. He smiles.

"It's perfectly possible. Just bloody difficult," Eames replies,  _just like a certain point man of yours_,  he refrains from adding. Cobb smiles in surprise and looks validated. 

"That's what Ikeep saying to Arthur," he says triumphantly and Eames schools his expression into nonchalance, when his mind is already whirring with  _Arthur, Arthur, Arthur_.

"Arthur? You're still working with that stick-in-the-mud?" he drawls, blasé, when he is well aware of how long Arthur has stuck with Cobb. He bristles, thinking of how one day, the calls had stopped coming. Upon searching, Eames had found the Cobb-Arthur Dream Team had taken on some tosser named Nash as a forger. It seemed Arthur had gotten bored of him.

"He's a good point man," Cobb says slowly, eyes narrowed, sensing the underlying tension despite Eames attempts to act uncaring. He curses under his breath at the perceptive fucker. 

"The best," Eames concedes, trying to set Cobb at ease, then immediately changes the subject, "But he has no  imagination. If you're going to perform inception, you need imagination,"and they are back on track, Cobb's hackles lowering like a stray cat won over. 

—

As expected, when Eames finally does meet Arthur again, the man's a cold fish. A polite greeting, barely half a moment's eye contact and then Arthur's on his way to tap away at his keyboard or scratch notes into his Moleskine. For a brief moment, Eames yearns for the achingly responsive beauty he had in his bed all those nights... Then, he locks that yearning down somewhere deep and throws away the key. If professionalism is what Arthur wanted, professionalism he would get.

—

"I've had ample opportunity to observe Browning, adopt his physical presence, study his mannerisms so on and so forth..." Eames tells the team, reading his dossier on Browning.

"In the first layer of the dream, I can impersonate Browning, and suggest concepts to Fischer's conscious mind. Then, when we take him a level deeper, his own projection of Browning should feed that right back to him," Eames continues, glancing first at Cobb, then Arthur for their input.

"So he gives himself the idea," Arthur says, animated with an energy that Eames has yet to see from him. "Precisely," Eames says slowly, elaborates,"That's the only way it'll stick, it has to seem self-generated." 

"Eames," Arthur says his name, slow as molasses, leaning back in his chair almost lazily, Eames eyes gravitate towards him unbidden, "I am.. Impressed," he says with a pithy nod. Eames feels a burst of pleasure at the praise, a flash of hope that Arthur has begun to thaw and then something in Arthur's eyes shutters. Eames' hackles raise immediately and he looks away for a second to formulate his response.

"Your condescension, as always, is much appreciated Arthur, thank you," Eames replies casually, slightly sardonically, eyes carefully blank of emotion. He doesn't linger to see Arthur's reaction. 

—

Eames paces, looking at the board detailing Fischer and his relationship with his father. _Positive emotional logic..._ For a relationship so strained and toxic at its root. How could Fischer possibly associate his father with anything positive, after all the years of living in his shadow? Unbidden, Eames eyes fall on Arthur, who is deep in thought, staring into his notebook. Eames eyes follow the curve of his jaw, the bow of his sweet lips and he has a flash of fondness, a memory of better times. And then, it hits him.

Fischer's childhood. Maurice Fischer was a formidable man who expected so much from his son and put more pressure on him than any other father, trying to train him relentlessly into running his empire. But he couldn't have been priming his son for his inheritance since he was born, he was a man, not a monster. At some point, there was a version of his father that Fischer, as a child, loved and looked up to. An image of his father that Robert Fischer wanted to mold himself into... Be a leader in his own right and do his father proud. 

"Try this," Eames says, "My father accepts that I want to create for myself, not follow in his footsteps," and Cobb eyes widen.

"That might work," he says, sounding excited, eyes flashing with the manic drive he was known for across Dreamshare.Eames feels a burst of satisfaction and pride, then Arthur interjects and it's like a bucket of cold water. 

"Might?" Arthur scoffs, "We have to do better than 'might'." Eames clenches his jaw and turns the full force of his glare at him. 

"Thanks for the contribution, Arthur," he says lightly, in counterpoint to his raised eyebrows and belligerent expression. Arthur's brows furrow and he holds eye contact with Eames longer than a minute for possibly the first time since this shoddy job began.

"Forgive me for wanting a little specificity, Eames," he retorts and Eames scoffs in turn, mouthing"specificity" back at him mockingly. "Specificity," Arthur repeats and Cobb shuts him down, "Inception is not about being specific. When we get inside his mind, we're going to have to work with what we find," effectively putting him in his place. 

_ Unimaginative cunt _ , Eames thinks, derogatorily, as Arthur purses his lips and turns back to his Moleskine, brows still furrowed and an angry flush to his cheeks. Eames can't help but linger on the heat behind that smooth, alabaster skin, feeling a pang of guilt for insulting the exquisite man, even in his mind. He forcibly shakes himself out of it a minute later and frowns, feeling like a lovesick fool.

—

Unfortunately, for Eames, all that pent up frustration leads to petty antagonism. If he can't get a rise out of Arthur the way he used to ("_uhn_ _ , fuck, Eames! _ " echoes in his ears), then he'll just have to get it another way, won't he? 

"What's a kick?" Ariadne asks Cobb and Eames just can't resist the opportunity, eyes on the lean, delicious lines of Arthur's body in his slightly tipped chair. He nudges it, ever so slightly with the tip of his shoe, his hand on his chin, and smiles when Arthur flails for balance and glares at him the minute he hits solid ground. 

He smiles fondly every time Yusuf gives Arthur the kick later in their test runs, recalling the flash of annoyance in Arthur's eyes, a sharp contrast to his carefully expressionless face. They make one, two, three test runs just so Cobb's stodgy, brilliantly meticulous point man can finally reassure himself the compound will kick them awake despite heavy sedation. 

—

And then, all that meticulous planning goes to shit. 

(" _Are you alright?! _ " Arthur screams, turning back from the driver's seat, eyes wide with panic, bullets ricocheting around them. 

"_Yeah, I- I'm okay. I'm okay_, " Eames stutters, too shaken to notice the hoarse desperation to Arthur's voice, as if he couldn't bear the thought of Eames getting shot, even in a dream.)

He walks into the warehouse to Cobb shouting, "Don't tell me to calm down! This was your job goddamnit- Your responsibility! -- meant to check Fischer's background thoroughly --  We are _NOT _prepared for this type of violence! " Arthur pleads in return, tone apologetic but firm, clearly unused to the extractor he has worked with for years shouting right in his face, nose to nose, furious as Saito bleeds out on the floor at their feet.

Eames only has a brief moment to wonder how the hell Arthur could make such a huge oversight, not knowing Fischer was militarized, before he's pushing himself between Cobb and Arthur, stomach twisting at the shocked, ashamed, slightly frightened expression on the point man's face, with a gun trained on Saito.

"Let's put him out of his misery," is all he gets a chance to say before Cobb is body checking him into the taxi, shouting " _No, don't do that!_"

And, impossibly, it gets worse. 

"Right, so what happens when we die?" Eames asks, blood running cold, his fury hiding behind a facade of calm. 

"We drop into Limbo," Cobb says, averting his eyes shamefully. Eames breathes heavily, hearing the muted sound of Arthur raging at Cobb, a reversal of a few minutes ago. Ariadne's petrified confusion and her shrill voice grates on Eames ears as his world narrows to a point. 

If they screw this up... If he screws this up...

"_W_ _ e drop into Limbo _ ," echoes in his ears.

"Great. Thank you," he says to Cobb after Arthur and Yusuf carry Saito away. "So now we're stuck in Fischer's mind battling it out with his private army, and if we get hit we're stuck in Limbo 'til our brains dissolve into scrambled egg, hm?" he continues, flatly, looking into Dom Cobb's cold, manipulative eyes. Cobb walks away without a word, without a single apology uttered and Eames vows to never work with the man again.

—

Suddenly, the whole job takes on a desperate, unreal edge. It's hard, it's so hard to mask his emotions when any minute he could be mowed down by a violent projection and dropped into Limbo. This job,it could be his last and he sees the reflection of that thought in everyone'sfaces. Arthur's face, he ends up looking at a lot more than the rest. 

After all, he might never see it again.

(So you must forgive him, if he finds excuses. Finds small, quiet moments where he and Arthur are alone in the dreamscape.

" _ You mustn't be afraid to dream a little bigger, darling _ ," he says, gently taking the rifle out of Arthur's hands, their fingers brush and the endearment slips out at the tail-end of his sentence, projecting fear and muted longing.

"_Security's going to run you down hard_, " he says, gruffly, unbuttoning his collar. Before he can grab the IV line, Arthur takes his wrist but avoids his eyes. Eames smiles as the man delicately inserts the IV into his vein, and mutters "_And I will lead them on a merry chase_." 

"_Just be back before the kick_,"  Eames says, blinking up at the ceiling, when what he really means is  _Just stay alive, please just stay alive_. 

"Go to sleep, Mr. Eames,"  he murmurs, almost tenderly, a note of...  something  in his voice. Eames doesn't have long to think about it, to analyze the cadence, study the strangely fond use of formality.He does as Arthur says and goes to sleep, hoping to wake up to see another day and spend another day with Arthur.)

—

He blinks,

Floating, in an elevator.

He blinks,

Swimming, surfacing from the water.

He blinks,

Arthur, sitting across the aisle, smiling at him.

—

Arthur is lost in thought, most of the remaining flight. The job, now that's it over, now that he's come out of it alive, seems like a kaleidoscope of scenes, with, and without Eames. He still remembers, the jarring shock of coming into Fischer's militarized subconscious. He remembers the shame, the confusion and the irrational feeling of betrayal he felt with himself. 

He remembers how he'd done everything to avoid letting Eames distract him, everything to avoid falling into his arms, into his bed. Eames had made it easy for him, with his bizarre oscillation between hot and cold, sharp sarcasm one minute and playful teasing the next. How, then, how had he so thoroughly fallen prey to Eames again, to the point that he'd compromised the job?

He looks towards Eames, sitting behind Cobb and he is still looking at him, hasn't stopped for the past 30 minutes, as if he needs to drink everything about Arthur in lest he lose it. Arthur smiles again, tentatively, cautiously, then turns back to the window, mind whirring because instead of feeling elated for achieving inception, he feels a storm of emotions that have nothing to do with the job, and everything to do with Eames. 

He wishes he could say, over the flight, that he found clarity. That the reason for his obsession with Eames, his unrelenting attachment to Eames, hit him over the head like a hammer... But, it didn't. Arthur wasn't good at figuring people out, until today, he'd thought he at least knew himself. He was wrong. 

When Arthur gets off the plane, he can feel eyes on him. Eames eyes, following him through the terminal all the way to baggage claim, where he loiters behind him as he collects his suitcase. Before Arthur can decide if he's going to walk past Eames as planned, or make a careful approach, Eames makes the decision for him.

"Come to dinner with me," he says, when Arthur turns around, coming face to face with Eames, almost bumping right into him. 

"S- Sorry?" Arthur stutters and backs away slightly. Eames moves forward and closes the gap, he's close enough that Arthur can see the specks of green in his blue irises and the determination in his eyes. Arthur's eyes flick down to Eames' lips and the memories flash through his mind like a movie reel. What surprises him is that interspersed with the memories of Eames mouth on him, kissing him all over his body, there are memories of his fond smiles, his wry smirks and even his sardonic, angry grins. 

Eames grabs his free hand, thumb on the back of his hand, brushing lightly. "Arthur, come to dinner with me," he repeats and Arthur thinks of how Eames led him to distraction by his sheer presence, of how five hours ago, he thought it might be the last time he'd see Eames. 

"Okay," Arthur says and Eames beams, presses a chaste kiss to his mouth, laces their fingers together and leads him out of LAX. Arthur still hasn't quite figured it out, what it is about Eames that makes his thought processes halt and turn slow as molasses, but he thinks with time, he could find out. 

**Author's Note:**

> Honestly, a good alternative title would be Arthur is an Emotionally Stunted Cockslut. It's okay, the current title is almost just as cheesy and terrible.
> 
> Update: Made some edits to fix mistakes, structure, missing italic text


End file.
